PREFACE 



TO THE 



FIRST AND SECOND EDITIONS. 



THE small work which I present to the reader, for his use 

 and information, I may presume to style truly practical, 

 since I have, throughout my life, been a breeder and 

 keeper, and also an amateur of domestic poultry, pigeons, 

 and rabbits ; at some periods, upon rather a considerable 

 scale ; and have, for many years together, kept a register 

 of the results. I have farther done that which, I believe, 

 no other man has taken the pains to do, kept a regular 

 stud book for those breeders, scarcely one of which was 

 so poor as to be without a name ; and Regulus, Sampson, 

 Fiea-catcher, Selima, Moreau, Isaac, and Tom Paine, 

 shine with peculiar lustre on my poultry and pigeon list.; 

 whilst Corney Butter-cup, Adam, Beelzebub, Lucifer, 

 Carolina, Hecuba, make a figure equally splendid and 

 equally useful, among the rabbits. I think Montaigne 

 says somewhere, that if a man would sit down and de- 

 scribe that which he has known practically, upon almost 

 any subject, he could scarcely fail of being useful. Just 

 so far ray ambition extends. Nor is the world entirely 

 without need of advice on this subject, notwithstanding 

 its antiquity, and the multitude of counsellors. Of this 

 fact I had a signal proof, in a visit a few years since 

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